


Old Wooden Fence

by FromAnonymousToZ



Category: Over the Garden Wall (Cartoon & Comics)
Genre: And how unfathomable they are as individuals, Descriptions of eldritch beings through a lense we understand, I heard someone ordered esoteric beastnoch-, Imagery, Just a little outside look at Enoch and the Beast, Just stream of consciousness writing, M/M, No Plot/Plotless, Not plot driven, Short & Sweet, Suffer then, There is no plot, Thresholds, hello yes, just me?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:22:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28430841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FromAnonymousToZ/pseuds/FromAnonymousToZ
Summary: Thresholds, in the simplest of terms, are the places where something ends and another thing begins.And that is where the cat waits.
Relationships: The Beast/Enoch (Over the Garden Wall)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 15





	Old Wooden Fence

Thresholds, in the simplest of terms, are the places where something ends and another thing begins. They can be doorways or gates, boundaries on maps, or the lines of the earth. The thing to understand about thresholds is that something changes when you cross them. 

For example, something that may be true on one side; for example, the dead do not get out of their graves and walk about, is not necessarily true on the other. 

Now there are many thresholds in the unknown. There is one where the sky meets the sea and one where the sea meets land. There is yet another for where sky and land come together; sky draped like gentle fabric twisting into the forest. There were the borders of kingdoms and territories and towns, there were rivers and fences and doors, and all of these structures marked thresholds. 

However, there is only one threshold in the unknown that one can step over from a land of the living into a world of the dead. 

At this border sits a cat. 

Now, he is so much more than a cat. He is the cool wind of autumn and the warm embrace of a mother as she pulls her babe close. He is the bite of liquor and the spice of cider twisting on the tongue. He is the chalk-white grave and the yellow blossom of pumpkins. He is golden mead and contentment and ease. He is war and bloodshed and conquest and rot and death, and he is peace and rest and satisfaction and pleasure. 

He is graying hair around the temples, and a glass of wine on a porch as the wind blows the last remnants of summer through the air. He’s finally aged whisky glowing golden in a glass, and trees disregarding their leaves. He’s sweet blossoms turning to rot and the soft tickle of a piano’s keys. He’s a song in the cornstalks and a casket unearthed by the storm. He’s wood and dirt and sun. He’s warmth and calmness and the serenity of a pool of water, reflection glinting in the sunlight. He’s the promise of coming winter and fading summer.

He is a flagging hope and a warm grave, he is bones and flesh and feathers, he is old books and rusting swords, he is a healer and a life taker, he is a keeper of a gate and a provider, he’s a monster, and almost a man. He’s the dirt and coloring leaves and the roots of fall. He’s autumn himself and something much more than I can properly give him credit for, something made of plenty. He’s a deity and a politician. He’s a peacekeeper and a pawn, the tipping piece in a game that only he is playing. 

He’s hay and wood and bone and blood. He’s autumn leaves and cornsilk and cobwebs and dirt. He’s mushrooms and alcohol and apples and an orchard; he’s old roots and freshly turned soil. He's a warm breeze and a cold drink playing through your hair. He’s a thousand crickets laying down their bows, he the last firefly’s dying glow.

But for now, he is a cat. 

He dares not cross the fine line of the threshold, for though he would undoubtedly be welcomed, it was never polite to cross a threshold without the permission of the master of each side.

So he waits. 

Now I wouldn't say he’s waiting for a person exactly, but he’s also not waiting for some _thing_ to happen either, so we shall call the entity he’s waiting for a who. 

There are often decades between their meetings, months at the very least. The cat doesn't have much of a head for time. He couldn't give you exact dates, but the point is, the cat is waiting.

Now the cat, or rather, all of what the cat could be, should he choose, could often be found waiting for this particular individual. 

But he didn't often do his waiting at the borders. 

He did it deep inside his town, tucked far from the boundary of the threshold. 

Most of the time, at least.

For now, he waits at the border. 

He waits for a creature who is so much more than a mere person. 

He is shadow, cold and calm, and fire, frigid, and consuming. He is hunger and fear and hope and the guttering of a dying light. He is blazing eternity and cold iron wrought together to carry a flame. 

His touch is the bite of steel and frostbite alike, searing naked flesh. He is an orchestrator of twisted trees and old paths worn smooth by footfall. He is dying hope and rising despair clinging to the mind and driving it to madness. 

He is merciless. 

He is a garden watered by oil and pain. He is empty and vast and an enormous forest, as unfathomable and deep as the sea.

He is an icy winter and a roaring flame. He is yellow and blue and red and every color in between, but he is dark most of the time. He is contrast and surrender. He is an eternal life and an endless hunger. 

He’s a song, roaring through the trees, thrumming over pastures, and raking through doors. He’s the wind’s lullaby and the wolves’ hymn. He’s the song of songbirds and the tune of the forest; he’s a turning song that makes reality ripple at its edges and becomes so thin and brittle it breaks. He’s a mother’s lullaby and a priest’s chant, a brother’s teasing, and a sister’s worried voice. His voice is the yipping of hounds and the purring of cats. He’s the breeze and the trees and the hoot of the lonesome owl luring his prey deeper into the woods. He’s a song you’ve half-forgotten but still know.

He’s wood and shadow and souls. He’s a battered lantern and a flock of ravens and a swarm of moths and a pack of wolves, turtle shells, and magic. He’s the trees and the creature roaming through them and the lantern hanging on the creature.

He’s the feeling of being watched. He’s the eyes in the trees and the saplings in the cold hard dirt. He’s a prickling feeling at the back of your nape and tiredness so thick it makes you see shadows in the corners of your eyes. He’s submission and succumbing to the earth. He is hope failing and boiling down and aging into despair like fine wine. 

He’s a bottle in the cellar that whispers of evil and is older than the house itself. He’s an old book tucked under the floorboards and ignored but never forgotten, a doll that the dog drags in that can't be thrown away. 

He’s an empty plate and a growling stomach, and a dwindling hearth.

He’s a forest and a gardener and a flame and a lantern and a song.

And the cat loves him for it. 

When they are together, they are a whirlwind, consuming and consumed, a fire feeding itself. They are a change of seasons, a rising of trees, and a cutting of them. They are a back and forth, a conversation flung wide by the wind. They are a death perpetuated by life. They are a song rising over the meadow, a melody sweeping over the reeds. They are a harmony held in eternity. 

They are ice plunged into a hearth, burning and freezing at once. They are a twining and whispering lullaby. They are an insidious afterlife and a turning autumn, and a rising of frost. 

There are places where they run together, meeting so sweetly as if they were made to each other. They do not quite meet hollow and unrecognized in some places, and in others still, they overlap in harsh edges and clashing lines. 

When they are together, they are laughter, rapturous, and mirthful. They are a story only half spun from cobwebs and dreams. They are bone and wood and oil and blood. When they are together, they are a collection of quiet remarks and sly grins traded over the heads of others. They are an alliance so old it predates half of the grave. They are plans and plots and schemes exchanged over a simple wooden fence, and they are roots of edelwoods and pumpkins twining where no one can see. 

They are autumn and winter caught in an embrace, trading bites as easily as kisses, they are melting and freezing, and they are alive, and they are dead, and they are cold, and they are hot, and they are together. 

They are a tapestry of blue, black, and purple, woven with orange, yellow, green, and red. Where they meet, they spin into one another, intertwined and interwoven, gossamer and coarse. They are cobwebs and cornsilk braided into wool and fur. The fine threads pulled apart at the seams where they meet to reveal ravenous teeth in a flashing maw. 

They are a fire burning cold in a grave they are a drink tainted with blood staining the lips. 

They are oil-stained agony marred bark wrapped up in rapture the color of cornsilk. They are a hunger finally sated, and a satiation finally consumed.

Beautiful and awful.

Hungry and satiated.

Loving and beloved.


End file.
